


New Friends and Old Wounds

by BatmanWhoLaughss



Series: Your War's Not Ended [3]
Category: Star Wars - All Media Types, Star Wars: Rebels
Genre: Angst, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Episode: s01e15 Fire Across the Galaxy, F/M, Fights, Fluff, Fluff and Angst, Hera Syndulla Needs A Hug, Hurt/Comfort, Kanan Jarrus Needs a Hug, Post-Episode: s01e15 Fire Across the Galaxy
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-01-12
Updated: 2021-01-12
Packaged: 2021-03-16 22:07:36
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,981
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28714029
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/BatmanWhoLaughss/pseuds/BatmanWhoLaughss
Summary: “Kanan, what’s wrong? Talk to me.”He doesn’t speak for a moment, just stands there silently until he eventually lets out a low sigh.“You knew,” he whispers. And that does make her freeze, because his voice is so quiet but she can hear the pain there all the same. “You knew about Ahsoka, and you didn’t tell me.”
Relationships: Kanan Jarrus & Ahsoka Tano, Kanan Jarrus/Hera Syndulla
Series: Your War's Not Ended [3]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1759150
Comments: 10
Kudos: 71





	New Friends and Old Wounds

**Author's Note:**

> This concept has been bugging me for so long now and I finally wrote it down. I feel like Kanan would definitely have a lot of feelings to work through once he found out about Ahsoka, like he'd have so much to process with everything going on. 
> 
> Enjoy!

It’s been two weeks since they rescued Kanan from Mustafar, and Hera’s starting to get worried. 

She’s been worried the whole time, of course. Worried about Kanan’s physical recovery, about what he went through on Tarkin’s ship and about how he feels about joining the Rebellion. She tried her best to spend as much time with him as possible, while he was healing, but recently, she can see him starting to pull away. He’s been making excuses more and more, muttering about how he needs to get back to work teaching Ezra and spending less and less time with her. She can see something in his eyes, every time he looks at her, and it makes her stomach churn. 

Today’s the fifth day in a row that she’s barely seen him at all, and Hera knows she has to get to the bottom of things and at least try to talk to him. She _misses_ him, and she wonders if he can feel it permeating throughout the ship. She misses the way things used to be, before she nearly lost him forever and something drove a wedge between them. 

It’s not until late in the day that she finally tracks him down, and she finds him sitting in the cockpit of the Ghost. He doesn’t make a move when she approaches, doesn’t even nod in greeting, and the small sign almost stops her in her tracks. He always, _always_ , smiles at her when he sees her, but the fact that he doesn’t even bother to acknowledge her presence turns her insides to ice. Something is _wrong_ , much more wrong than she thought. 

Hera swallows. “...Kanan?” 

He’s still silent, but this time he jerks his head- a small nod to acknowledge that she spoke. So she tries again, moving to stand next to him and glance down at his face. “Love? Everything alright?” 

Kanan nods again. “Things are quiet,” he says, sidestepping the question but answering it at the same time. Before she can speak again, Kanan gets up, moving past her towards the cockpit door. “If you’re taking over, there’s a message from Fulcrum and Sato that you should probably get.” 

She doesn’t miss the extra venom in his voice when he says Fulcrum’s- _Ahsoka’s_ codename, and suddenly she fears she knows exactly what this is about. But now her heart is constricting, because he’s closed off from her in a way he’s never been. Before he can leave the room, she stops him with a hand on his arm, and wills her voice not to tremble. “Kanan, what’s wrong? Talk to me.” 

That makes him stop, but he doesn’t turn around. His back is to her, and she can see the tension in his shoulders where they rise up ever-so-slightly. He doesn’t speak for a moment, just stands there silently until he eventually lets out a low sigh. 

“You knew,” he whispers. And that _does_ make her freeze, because his voice is so quiet but she can hear the pain there all the same. “You knew about Ahsoka, and you didn’t tell me.” 

The small statement pierces her like a knife, and Hera sucks in a breath. She’d been so worried about helping his body heal that she didn’t worry about his heart, and now that the words are out there in the open she realizes that she should have seen this coming. If she stopped to think for more than two minutes, she would have seen it coming. But he sounds so… _sad_ , so lost and miserable that all she wants to do is wring his pain out of him like a wet rag. But she can hear the anger lurking there too, and she almost wishes he were yelling. “I…” she wills her voice not to tremble as she rests a hand on his arm again. “I didn’t know she was a Jedi. I’d only seen her face before, I swear. I would have told you if I’d known.” She’s trying to stop her eyes from watering. This isn’t a Kanan she’s used to dealing with. He’s… raw, the old scab wounds left by the Purge ripped open and bleeding again, and she knows she needs to tread carefully. 

Now Kanan turns around, but he’s still tense, and Hera’s heart constricts further when he doesn’t look her in the eye. His face is tilted downwards instead, his hands shoved into his pockets. “Don’t lie to me,” he says, and his voice is firmer now. The anger is seeping into his tone, and Hera can feel her insides clench a bit more. “You know what it would’ve meant to me, to know I wasn’t the only one left, and you just… you kept it from me.”

She’s shaking all over, because she can tell he doesn’t believe her. That terrifies her, because he’s _always_ trusted her, from the first day they met, but now she can see the betrayal and hurt written all over his face. “Kanan, _no_ , I‒” She swallows down the lump in her throat as her voice breaks. “I wouldn’t lie to you about this, you _know_ that. I swear, if I knew she was a Jedi I would have told you.” 

For another moment, he’s silent, as the tears in her eyes threaten to spill over. But then he finally looks her in the eye, and she can see all the pain buried in the brilliant blue. He sighs again. “And I’m supposed to just believe you? We’re supposed to trust each other, Hera. And I want to believe you, but keeping that from me… what am I supposed to think?” 

He’s still not yelling, and that’s somehow the worst part. There’s a pit opening up in her stomach, because this is… this is something she doesn’t know if she can fix. She hurt him, deeply; she can see it in the way he’s looking at her. And as much as she wants things to be normal between them again, she’s terrified that they won’t be ever again. He looks like someone who just found out the entire galaxy has been off-kilter for years, and honestly she can’t really blame him. But she has to at least _try_ to get through to him. 

She lets out a shaky sigh as a stray tear trails down the side of her face. “Kanan, listen to me.” She chances taking a step closer to him and resting a hand on his bicep again. She meets his eyes, trying desperately to keep the tears at bay. “I swear on my brother’s soul I didn’t know.” It’s the most solemn promise she can give him, and she hopes it’s enough to get through the fog of hurt that’s surrounding him right now. 

His shoulders are tense again, and she can see the uncertainty mixing with the mix of emotions already present in his eyes. Finally he turns away, moving towards the cockpit door. “I need to think,” he mutters. 

“I‒” She bites down on a sob. “Sure. Of course,” she whispers. 

Kanan exits the cockpit without another word. For a moment she’s still frozen stiff, staring at the door with an open-mouthed expression. Then she collapses into the chair next to her, a hollow ache in her chest and tears running down her cheeks. 

\-------

Kanan hasn’t talked to Hera for three days. 

He’s mostly spent that time meditating, trying to clear his head and get rid of the swirl of doubt and betrayal that’s been hanging over him since he came back from Mustafar. He can _feel_ how miserable she is, feel the truth in her words when she said she didn’t know, but something in him is keeping him from forgiving her. He’s not sure what it is; he knows he shouldn’t be sitting here nursing his wounds like a tortured animal, but he can’t forget the icy feeling that came over his whole body when he saw the lightsabers hanging from Ahsoka’s belt. The vague memories of his temple days, of hearing the stories about her and Skywalker and occasionally sparring with her before he was assigned to Master Billaba have been playing on a steady loop in his head since then.

But today, he’s been summoned to the Rebel command ship, and he’s sitting in the briefing room waiting for someone to tell him what he’s doing here. He doesn’t like _this_ either; it’s uncomfortably familiar to when he fought in the war. Maybe that’s part of why he’s still so upset with Hera. 

“Kanan?”

The quiet voice makes him tense, and when he turns around, she’s standing there watching him with a curious, almost guarded expression. _Ahsoka Tano._ The one at the center of all of his messy emotions. When he raises an eyebrow at her, she gives him a small smile. “I thought we should… talk.” She gestures for him to take a seat at the small table in the briefing room, and he does so without saying anything. 

For a few moments there’s only silence. Ahsoka watches him with that guarded smile and Kanan stares back at her, doing his best to keep his face neutral even as his entire body feels tense. This isn’t a conversation he wants to have, and the way Ahsoka watches him makes him feel like she can see right through him. 

Finally, Ahsoka speaks. “You’re angry,” she says, her voice maddeningly calm. 

Inwardly, Kanan cringes, but he doesn’t bother denying it. He tries to keep his face relatively neutral. “Yeah. Not at you. Not really.” 

Ahsoka nods, her expression thoughtful. “I can’t say I blame you, to be honest.” Then her eyes soften. “But for what it’s worth, Captain Syndulla really didn’t know my identity. Only my face.” 

Kanan can feel his defenses rising, in spite of himself. “That’s between me and her.” 

Ahsoka raises her hands in a gesture of surrender. “She worries about you. But it was my choice to keep myself a secret, so if you want to be angry with someone, be angry with me.”

Now, Kanan can’t help but sigh. “I know why you did it,” he finally says, after a moment of silence. “And part of me is still trying to process the fact that there’s another Jedi left. But I can’t help being angry.” 

“I didn’t know there was a Jedi on Captain Syndulla’s crew until that business with the Wookies,” Ahsoka says. She looks almost sad now. “There were times I wanted to tell both of you, but... I knew it would just put your team in more danger.” She smiles again. “I guess you know what Master Yoda and Master Windu would have said.” 

In spite of himself, Kanan laughs. “Comes first, the mission does,” he mutters, his face tilting downward.

Unexpectedly, he feels a hand come to rest on his shoulder, and he looks up to meet Ahsoka’s eyes again. “I’m sorry,” she says. “I understand how you must be feeling. I wish we hadn’t blindsided you like this.” 

Kanan shakes his head. “I get it. Really, I do, it’s just… it’s a lot to process.” But his lips curl into a smile, in spite of it all. “You haven’t changed, you know. Not a bit.” 

Ahsoka raises an eyebrow, and Kanan’s smile grows. “We used to spar, sometimes, back at the Temple. You could always tell when something was on my mind.”

Her brow furrows, but he can see the moment it clicks. “I remember,” she says, thoughtfully. “You went by a different name back then, didn’t you? I thought you seemed familiar.”

“Yeah. My real name was Caleb Dume, but I haven’t used it since the Purge.” 

“I’m sorry.”

“Yeah,” Kanan says. “I’m sorry, too.”

Kanan swallows thickly, rubbing at the back of his neck. “There’s so much I want to ask you,” he says in a low voice. “I thought I was the only one left, for _years_. And now everything’s just‒”

“I know the feeling,” Ahsoka says, chuckling softly. “I thought I was alone too.”

“Are there… any others? Who survived?” The question has been sitting in the back of his mind ever since he found out Ahsoka was alive, and he can’t help but ask. 

But Ahsoka’s face falls. “Not that I know of. I tried to keep my eyes open but…”

Kanan nods. “Yeah. Right.” He can’t say the answer is unexpected. 

They both fall silent again. He’s still struggling to process a lot of this, namely the fact that there’s _another Jedi_ sitting in front of him after years of thinking he was the only one left. It’s like a piece of himself that died a long time ago is starting to grow back. 

For a few moments they both just sit there, and Kanan is startled to realize that he can feel Ahsoka’s presence so strongly like a beacon. It’s been _so_ long since he felt another Force-sensitive that isn’t Ezra; he almost forgot what it feels like. 

Then Ahsoka speaks again. “Your apprentice seems remarkably gifted,” she says, thoughtfully. 

Kanan smiles. “He is. Much more so than I ever was. He gets most of it from Hera.” Then his expression turns curious for a moment. “Maybe… maybe you could help me train him? There’s a lot he could learn from someone like you.” 

Ahsoka grins back at him. “I’d like that.”

\-------

Hera’s been working on repairs all day. She’s currently lying belly up underneath the pilot’s console, fiddling with wires that stubbornly refuse to connect the way they’re supposed to. Grumbling, she reaches for the wrench net to her, muttering about ship parts and aching muscles and anything she can think of to distract from her swirling thoughts. 

Kanan still hasn’t said a word to her. She respects him and his need for space, but it _hurts_ , the way he looked at her like he didn’t know who she was anymore. She’s been thinking of nothing but that look for days now, doing her best to distract herself with anything she can, even though nothing seems to take away the ache in her chest. She misses him something awful, but she knows that she has to let him come to her, when he’s ready. And she’s been doing her best to push down the fear that he never will.

She’s still groping blindly for the wrench, letting out a quiet curse as it continues to elude her. 

“A few inches to the right,” says a quiet voice by her feet.

Hera jumps, narrowly avoiding hitting her head, and sits up so fast she feels her head spinning. Kanan is standing behind the copilot’s seat, carrying two cups of caf and watching her intently. He seems shy, almost, and his shoulders are hunched over the way they always are when he’s upset. He hands her one of the mugs as she climbs to her feet on slightly shaky legs. “Kanan?” 

His chin tilts downwards, slightly. “Hi,” he mumbles. “Thought you might need this.” His eyes are still boring into hers, a mix of fear and doubt and sadness in them. It’s like he’s begging for her to take the mug as some sort of peace offering, and she tries to ignore the sudden pounding of her heart. 

For a moment, the two of them stand there in silence, just looking at each other, until Hera offers him a small smile after taking a sip of caf and he visibly deflates. His shoulders relax, all the fight going out of him in one breath as he sighs. “I’m sorry,” he whispers. 

But Hera shakes her head, setting the mug down on the console and stepping closer to him. “Don’t be,” she says.

The hand that’s not holding his own mug reaches for her own. “I didn’t know how to process everything.” His forehead falls ruther to lean against her own. “First finding out that there was another survivor, then thinking you deliberately kept that a secret from me… that hurt. That really hurt.”

“I know. It’s okay.”

But Kanan shakes his head. “It’s not. I shouldn’t have jumped to conclusions.” He pauses for a moment before his voice gets softer. “Wasn’t fair. Should’ve listened to you.”

Hera shakes her head again, as she takes another step towards him and rests her hand on his lower back. Out of the corner of her eye, she sees him set his own mug down. “I don’t blame you, love. You were dealing with a lot.” 

He’s still for a moment, but then his arm curls around her waist to pull her closer and Hera feels herself instantly relax. Every time they fight, it always leaves her on edge, and she’s never able to really calm down until they talk things out. “I do trust you, y’know?” he says. “I always have.”

That makes her smile for the first time in days. “I trust you, too. Are…” she hesitates, but when she sees him smiling too, she brings a hand up to his chest. “Are you okay?” 

Kanan sighs again. “I’m alright. There’s still just… a lot going on in my head.” But then his smile grows wider than she’s seen it in a _long_ time, and there’s pure disbelief in his eyes. “But _I’m not the only one left.”_

And there’s so much unadulterated joy in that statement that she can’t help but pull him closer. She’s so happy for him, and she knows the burden he carried for over a decade like a 50-kilo weight is finally lifted from his shoulders, at least a little bit. It’s refreshing, to see him happy again after watching him struggle so much over the past few months, and it’s rubbing off on her like a drug. 

And for the first time since he was captured on Lothal, she’s starting to think that things are really going to be okay. Maybe they’ll even be a lot better.


End file.
